


K BALLAD OF 

rm BOSTON 

Ten r\rjk 

^TORY OP 
•VisKeRMILL 



Dorothy 

Together with 

A Ballad of the Boston Tea Party 

& 

Grandmother's Story of Bunker Hill Battle 

By Oliver Wendell Holmes 

With Illustrations by 
Howard Pyle 




Boston and New York 

Houghton, Mifflin and Company 

(Cbe ftiUemDe prestf, <Canibrit>B'* 

MDCCCXCIII 






31 



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Copyright, 1874 ar >d 1875, 
By OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 

Copyright, 1892, 
By HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. 

All rights reserved. 



The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S.A. 
Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co. 




PREFACE 




OROTHY QUINCY, the subject of the 
first poem in this volume, was aunt 
of the first JosiaJi Quincy, Junior, 
" that fervid orator who expended 
his life for the cause of his country, dying on ship- 
board in sight of home, as he returned from Eng- 
land after hostilities had begun only seven days."'' 
She was also the aunt of a second Dorothy Quincy, 
who became the wife of John Hancock, President 
of the first Continental Congress. 

The painting hung in the house of my grand- 
father, Oliver Wendell which was oca/pied by 
British officers before the evacuation of Boston. 
One of these gentlemen amused himself by stabbing 
poor Dorothy (the pictured one) as near the right 
eye as his swordsmanship would serve him to do 
it. The canvas was so decayed that it became neces- 
sary to remount the painting, in the process of 

5 



doing which the hole made by the rapier was lost 
sight of. I took some photographs of the picture 
before it was transferred to the new canvas. 

The tax on tea, which was considered so odious 
and led to the act on which A Ballad of the Boston 
Tea Party is founded, was but a small 7iiatter, 
on ly two pence in the pound. But it involved a 
Principle of taxation, to which the Colonies would 
not submit. Their objection was not to the amount, 
but the claim. The East India Company, however, 
sent out a number of tea-ships to different Amer- 
ican ports, three of them to Boston. 

The inhabitants tried to send them back, but in 
vain. The captains of the ships had consented, if 
permitted, to return with their cargoes to England, 
but the consignees refused to discharge them from 
their obligations, the custom house to give them a 
clearance for their return, and the governor to 
grant tliem a passport for going by the fort. It 
was easily seen that the tea would be gradually 
landed from the ships lying so near the town, and 
that if lauded it would be disposed of and the 
purpose of establisliing the monopoly and raising 
a revenue effected. To prevent the dreaded conse- 
quence, a number of ar fried men, disguised like 
Indians, boarded the ships and threw their whole 
cargoes of tea into the dock. About seventeen per- 
sons boarded the ships in Boston harbor, and 
emptied three hundred and forty-two chests of tea. 1 
Among these " Indians " was Major Thomas Mel- 

1 Holmes's Annals of America, vol. ii. pp. 181-2. 

6 



ville, the same who suggested to me the poem, 

" The Last Leaf." 

The stay of Bunker 1 nil battle is told as liter- 
ally in accordance with the best authorities as it 
would have been if it had been written in prose 
instead of in verse. I have often been asked what 
steeple it was from which the little group I speak 
of looked upon the conflict. To this I answer that 
I am not prepared to speak authoritatively, but 
that the reader may take his choice among all the 
steeples standing at that time in the northern part 
of the city. Christ Church in Salem Street is the 
one I always think of but I do not insist upon its 
claim. As to the personages who made up the 
small company that followed the old corporal, it 
would be hard to identify them, but by ascertaining 
where the portrait by Copley is now to be found, 
some light may be thrown on their personality. 

Daniel Malcolm's gravestone, splintered by Brit- 
ish bullets, may be seen in the Copfs Hill burial- 
ground. 

O. TV. H, 




LIST or 

ILLVSTRATIONS 



DOROTHY O. page 

Portrait of Dorothy Q., from a painting in the pos- 
session of Dr. Holmes . . Frontispiece. 

Half Title 13 

Painting the Picture 14 

" Girlish bust, but womanly air " . . . . 15 

" Hint and promise of stately mien " . . . 17 

" The youthful sire " 18 

" Soft is the breath of a maiden's Yes " . . . 21 

" Lady and lover " 22 

A BALLAD OF THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY 

" The Boston teapot bubbled " .... 26 

Half Title 27 

A cup of Tea 28 

" Many a six-foot grenadier 

The flattened grass had measured" • • • 3 1 

" Her tearful memories treasured " ... 32 

" Behold the guests advancing" . . . -35 

" The lively barber " 36 

" The truant tapster " 39 

" The cooper's boys " 4° 

9 



" The lusty young Fort-Hillers ; ' .... 
" The Tories seize the omen " .... 

" The Mohawk band is swarming" . 
" So gracious, sweet, and purring " ... 

" The quiet dame " 

An Old North-Ender 

GRANDMOTHER'S STORY OF BUNKER-HILL 
BATTLE 
Watching the Battle from the Steeple 

Half Title 

The Grandmother .... 

" Lord Percy's hunted soldiers " 

" Says grandma ' What 's the matter ? ' " 

" The Mohawks killed her father " . 

" ' Don't you fret and worry any ' " 

" Down my hair went as I hurried " 

" The Corporal marched before " 

" We climbed the creaking stair " . 

" The earthwork hid them from us " , 

" The cannons' deafening thrill " 

" Like a gentleman of leisure " . ' , 

" The belted grenadiers " 

" The barges gliding onward " . 

" Again they formed in order " 

" They wait and answer not "• 

" The Corporal, our old cripple " 

Dan'l Malcolm's Grave 

" In the hush of expectation " 

" Like a thunder-cloud it breaks " 

" A headlong crowd is flying " 

" ' Are they beaten ? '" 

10 



43 

44 
47 
48 

5i 

5 2 



56 

57 

58 
61 
62 

65 
66 
69 
70 
73 
74 
77 
78 
81 
82 

85 
86 

89 
90 

93 
94 
97 
98 



" They are baffled, not defeated " . . . . 101 

" The roofs of Charlestown blazing " . . . 102 

" We can see each massive column" . . . 105 

" The ominous calm is broken " ... . 106 

" The frightened braves of Howe "... 109 

u We looked, poor timid creatures " . . . .110 

" ' Have a drop of old Jamaiky '" . . . . 113 

" They were creeping round to four " . . .114 

" In close array they come " 117 

" They surged above the breast-work" . . .118 

" They say I fainted " 121 

"' Here 's a soldier bleeding ' " 122 

" Brought him from the battle " . . . . 125 

" I saw his eyes were blue " . . . . .126 

" We came to know each other " . . . . 129 

" His picture Copley painted " . . 130 












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J) orothy Q. 

A 

SH Family Portrait 





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Dorothy O. 






Grandmother's mother : her age, I 
guess, 

Thirteen summers, or something less ; 

Girlish bust, but womanly air; 

Smooth, square forehead, with up- 
rolled hair, 

Lips that lover has never kissed ; 

Taper fingers and slender wrist ; 

Hanging sleeves of stiff brocade ; 

So they painted the little maid. 




On her hand a parrot green 
Sits unmoving and broods serene. 
Hold up the canvas full in view, — 
Look ! there 's a rent the light shines 

through, 
Dark with a century's fringe of 

dust, — 
That was a Red-Coat's rapier thrust ! 
Such is the tale the lady old, 
Dorothy's daughter's daughter, told. 



Who the painter was none may tell, — 
One whose best was not over well ; 
Hard and dry, it must be confessed, 
Flat as a rose that has long been 

pressed ; 
Yet in her cheek the hues are bright, 
Dainty colors of red and white, 
And in her slender shape are seen 
Hint and promise of stately mien. 
16 




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Look not on her with eyes of scorn, — 

Dorothy O. was a lady born ! 

Ay! since the galloping Normans 

came, 
England's annals have known her 

name, 
And still to the three-hilled rebel 

town 
Dear is that ancient name's renown, 
For many a civic wreath they won, 
The youthful sire and the gray-haired 

son. 

O Damsel Dorothy! Dorothy O. ! 
Strange is the gift that I owe to you; 
Such a gift as never a king 





to daughter or son 
bring, — 



might 



All my tenure of heart and hand, 
All my title to house and land ; 
J 9 



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Mother and sister and child and wife 
And joy and sorrow and death and 
life! 

What if a hundred years ago 

Those close-shut lips had answered 

No, 
When forth the tremulous question 

came 
That cost the maiden her Norman 

name, 
And under the folds that look so still 
The bodice swelled with the bosom's 

thrill ? 
Should I be I, or would it be 
One tenth another, to nine tenths 

me? 




Soft is the breath of a maiden's Yes : 
Not the light gossamer stirs with 
less; 

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But never a cable that holds so fast 
Through all the battles of wave and 





blast, 
And never an echo of speech or song 
That lives in the babbling air so Ions" ! 
There were tones in the voice that 

whispered then 
You may hear to-day in a hundred 

men. 



lady and lover, how faint and far 
Your images hover, — and here we 

are, 
Solid and stirring in flesh and bone, — 
Edward's and Dorothy's — all their 

own, — 
A goodly record for Time to show 
Of a syllable spoken so long ago ! — 
Shall I bless you, Dorothy, or forgive 
For the tender whisper that bade me 

live? 

2 3 




It shall be a blessing, my little maid ! 
I will heal the stab of the Red- Coat's 

blade, 
And freshen the gold of the tarnished 

frame, 
And gild with a rhyme your household 

name ; 
So you shall smile on us brave and 

bright 
As first you greeted the morning's 

light, 
And live untroubled by woes and 

fears 
Through a second youth of a hundred 

years. 

24 




f : TEA-PARTY M 




A 

BALLAD -,«, 

WW 

of the 

BOSTON 





Since Hebe served with nectar 
The bright Olympians and their Lord, 

Her over-kind protector, — 
Since Father Noah squeezed the 
grape 
And took to such behaving 
As would have shamed our grandsire 
ape 
Before the days of shaving, — 
No ! ne'er was mingled such a draught 

In palace, hall, or arbor, 
As freemen brewed and tyrants 
quaffed 
That night in Boston Harbor! 
29 



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It kept King George so long awake, 

His brain at last got addled, 
It made the nerves of Britain shake, 
With sevenscore millions saddled ; 
Before that bitter cup was drained, 

Amid the roar of cannon, 
The Western war-cloud's crimson 
stained 
The Thames, the Clyde, the Shan- 
non ; 

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Full many a six-foot grenadier 

The flattened grass had measured, 
And many a mother many a year 

Her tearful memories treasured** 
Fast spread the tempest's darkening 
pall, 

The mighty realms were troubled, 
The storm broke loose, but first of all 

The Boston teapot bubbled ! 




An evening party, — only that, 

No formal invitation, 
No gold-laced coat, no stiff cravat, 

^o feast in contemplation, 
No silk-robed dames, no fiddling band, 

No flowers, no songs, no dancing, — 
A tribe of red men, axe in hand, — 

Behold the guests advancing ! 
34 





^ 




How fast the stragglers join the 
throng, 
From stall and workshop gathered ! 
The lively barber skips along, 
And leaves a chin half-lathered; 
37 



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The smith has flung his hammer 
down, — 
The horseshoe still is glowing ; 
The truant tapster at the Crown 
Has left a beer-cask flowing; 
38 




The cooper's boys have dropped the 
adze, 
And trot behind their master; 
Up run the tarry ship-yard lads, — 
The crowd is hurrying faster, — 
4* 





Out from the Millpond's purlieus 
gush 
The streams of white-faced millers, 
And down their slippery alleys rush 
The lusty young Fort-Hillers ; 
42 





FKe Fort ^.Millers. 



The Tories. 




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The ropewalk lends its 'prentice 
crew, — 
The tories seize the omen : 
" Ay, boys, you '11 soon have work to 
do 
For England's rebel foemen, 
' King Hancock,' Adams, and their 

gang. 
That fire the mob with treason, — 
When these we shoot and those we 
hang, 
The town will come to reason." 
45 




On — on to where the tea-ships ride ! 

And now their ranks are forming, — 
A rush, and up the Dartmouth's side 

The Mohawk band is swarming ! 
See the fierce natives ! What a glimpse 

Of paint and fur and feather, 
As all at once the full-grown imps 

Light on the deck together ! 
A scarf the pigtail's secret keeps, 

A blanket hides the breeches, — 
And out the cursed cargo leaps, 

And overboard it pitches ! 
4 6 





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O woman, at the evening board 

So gracious, sweet, and purring, 
So happy while the tea is poured, 

So blest while spoons are stirring, 
What martyr can compare with thee, 

The mother, wife, or daughter, 
That night, instead of best Bohea, 

Condemned to milk and water ! 
49 



Ah, little dreams the quiet dame 

Who plies with rock and spindle 
The patient flax, how great a flame 

Yon little spark shall kindle ! 
The lurid morning shall reveal 

A fire no king can smother, 
Where British flint and Boston steel 

Have flashed against each other ! 
Old charters shrivel in its track, 

His Worship's bench has crumbled, 
It climbs and clasps the union-jack, 

Its blazoned pomp is humbled, 
The flags go down on land and sea 

Like corn before the reapers ; 
So burned the fire that brewed the tea 

That Boston served her keepers ! 




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The waves that wrought a century's 
wreck 

Have rolled o'er whig and tory ; 
The Mohawks on the Dartmouth's 
deck 

Still live in song and story ; 
The waters in the rebel bay 

Have kept the tea-leaf savor ; 
Our old North-Enders in their spray 

Still taste a Hyson flavor ; 
And Freedom's teacup still o'erfiows 

With ever fresh libations, 
To cheat of slumber all her foes 

And cheer the wakening nations ! 
53 




Here endeth 
A Ballad 
of the 





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§ 



grandmother's story 

of 

BUNKER HILL 

BATTLE 

1 



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'T is like stirring living embers when, 

at eighty, one remembers 
All the achings and the quakings of 

"the times that tried men's 

souls ; " 
When I talk of Whig and Tory, 

when I tell the Rebel story. 
To you the words are ashes, but to 

me they 're burning coals. 
59 






I had heard the muskets' rattle of the 

April running battle ; 
Lord Percy's hunted soldiers, I can 

see their red coats still ; 
But a deadly chill comes o'er me, as 

the day looms up before me, 
When a thousand men lay bleeding 

on the slopes of Bunker's Hill. 
60 





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'T was a peaceful summer's morning, 
when the first thing gave us warn- 
ing 

Was the booming of the cannon from 
the river and the shore : 

" Child," says grandma, " what 's the 
matter, what is all this noise and 
clatter ? 

Have those scalping Indian devils 
come to murder us once more ? " 
63 





Poor old soul ! my sides were shaking 

in the midst of all my quaking, 
To hear her talk of Indians when the 

guns began to roar : 
She had seen the burning village, and 

the slaughter and the pillage, 
When the Mohawks killed her father 

with their bullets through his 



door. 



64 




Then I said, " Now, dear old granny, 

don't you fret and worry any, 
For I '11 soon come back and tell you 

whether this is work or play ; 
There can't be mischief in it, so I 

won't be gone a minute " — 
For a minute then I started. I was 

gone the livelong day. 
67 





No time for bodice-lacing or for look- 
ing-glass grimacing; 

Down my hair went as I hurried, 
tumbling half-way to my heels ; 

God forbid your ever knowing, when 
there 's blood around her flowing, 

How the lonely, helpless daughter of 

a quiet household feels ! 
68 





In the street I heard a thumping; and 

I knew it was the stumping 
Of the Corporal, our old neighbor, on 

that wooden leg he wore, 
With a knot of women round him, — 

it was lucky I had found him, 
So I followed with the others, and the 

Corporal marched before. 
71 



They were making for the steeple, — 

the old soldier and his people; 
The pigeons circled round us as we 

climbed the creaking stair, 
Just across the narrow river — oh, 

so close it made me shiver ! — 
Stood a fortress on the hill-top that 

but yesterday was bare. 
72 




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Not slow our eyes to find it ; well we 

knew who stood behind it, 
Though the earthwork hid them from 

us, and the stubborn walls were 

dumb : 
Here were sister, wife, and mother, 

looking wild upon each other, 
And their lips were white with terror 

as they said, The hour has 

come ! 

75 




The morning slowly wasted, not a 

morsel had we tasted, 
And our heads were almost splitting 

with the cannons' deafening thrill, 
When a figure tall and stately round 

the rampart strode sedately ; 
It was Prescott, one since told me; 

he commanded on the hill. 
76 




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Every woman's heart grew bigger 
when we saw his manly figure, 

With the banyan buckled round it, 
standing up so straight and tall; 

Like a gentleman of leisure who is 
strolling out for pleasure, 

Through the storm of shells and can- 
non-shot he walked around the 
wall. 

79 



At eleven the streets were swarming, 
for the red-coats' ranks were 
forming ; 

At noon in marching order they were 
moving to the piers ; 

How the bayonets gleamed and glis- 
tened, as we looked far down, and 
listened 

To the trampling and the drum-beat 
of the belted grenadiers ! 
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At length the men have started, with 

a cheer (it seemed faint-hearted), 
In their scarlet regimentals, with 

their knapsacks on their backs, 
And the reddening, rippling water, as 

after a sea-fight's slaughter, 
Round the barges gliding onward 

blushed like blood along their 

tracks. 

83 





So they crossed to the other border, 

and again they formed in order ; 
And the boats came back for soldiers, 

came for soldiers, soldiers still : 
The time seemed everlasting to us 

women faint and fasting, — 
At last they 're moving, marching, 

marching proudly up the hill. 
84 



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We can see the bright steel glancing 

all along the lines advancing — 
Now the front rank fires a volley — 

they have thrown away their shot ; 
For behind their earthwork lying, all 

the balls above them flying, 
Our people need not hurry ; so they 

wait and answer not. 
*7 




Then the Corporal, our old cripple 

(he would swear sometimes and 

tipple), — 
He had heard the bullets whistle (in 

the old French war) before, — 
Calls out in words of jeering, just as 

if they all were hearing, — 
And his wooden leg thumps fiercely 

on the dusty belfry floor : — 
88 




" Oh ! fire away, ye villains, and earn 
King George's shillin's, 

But ye '11 waste a ton of powder afore 
a ' rebel ' falls ; 

You may bang the dirt and welcome, 
they 're as safe as Dan'l Mal- 
colm 

Ten foot beneath the gravestone that 
you 've splintered with your 
balls ! " 

91 





In the hush of expectation, in the 

awe and trepidation 
Of the dread approaching moment, 

we are well-nigh breathless all ; 
Though the rotten bars are failing on 

the rickety belfry railing, 

We are crowding up against them 

like the waves against a wall. 
92 





Just a glimpse (the air is clearer), 
they are nearer, — nearer, — 
nearer, 

When a flash — a curling smoke- 
wreath — then a crash — the 
steeple shakes — 

The deadly truce is ended ; the tem- 
pest's shroud is rended ; 

Like a morning mist it gathered, 
like a thunder-cloud it breaks ! 
95 




Oh the sight our eyes discover as the 

blue-black smoke blows over ! 
The red-coats stretched in windrows 

as a mower rakes his hay ; 
Here a scarlet heap is lying, there a 

headlong crowd is flying 
Like a billow that has broken and is 

shivered into spray. 
96 





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Then we cried, " The troops are 

routed ! they are beat — it can't 

be doubted ! 
God be thanked, the fight is over ! " 

— Ah ! the grim old soldier's 

smile ! 
" Tell us, tell us why you look so ? " 

(we could hardly speak, we shook 

so),— 
" Are they beaten ? Are they beaten ? 

Are they beaten ? " — " Wait a 

while." 

99 



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Oh the trembling and the terror ! for 
too soon we saw our error : 

They are baffled, not defeated; we 
have driven them back in vain ; 

And the columns that were scattered, 
round the colors that were tat- 
tered, 

Toward the sullen, silent fortress turn 
their belted breasts again. 




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All at once, as we are gazing, lo the 

roofs of Charlestown blazing ! 
They have fired the harmless village ; 

in an hour it will be down ! 
The Lord in heaven confound them, 

rain his fire and brimstone round 

them, — 
The robbing, murdering red-coats, 

that would burn a peaceful town ! 





They are marching, stern and solemn ; 

we can see each massive column 
As they near the naked earth-mound 

with the slanting walls so steep. 
Have our soldiers got faint-hearted, 

and in noiseless haste departed ? 

Are they panic-struck and helpless ? 

Are they palsied or asleep ? 
104 








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Now ! the walls they 're almost under ! 
scarce a rod the foes asunder ! 

Not a firelock flashed against them ! 
up the earthwork they will swarm ! 

But the words have scarce been spo- 
ken, when the ominous calm is 
broken, 

And a bellowing crash has emptied 
all the vengeance of the storm ! 
107 





So again, with murderous slaughter, 

pelted backwards to the water, 
Fly Pigot's running heroes and the 

frightened braves of Howe; 
And we shout, k ' At last they 're done 

for, it 's their barges they have 

run for : 
They are beaten, beaten, beaten ; and 

the battle 's over now ! " 

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And we looked, poor timid creatures, 
on the rough old soldier's fea- 
tures, 

Our lips afraid to question, but he 
knew what we would ask : 

" Not sure," he said ; " keep quiet, — 
once more, I guess, they '11 try 
it — 

Here 's damnation to the cut-throats ! " 
— then he handed me his flask, 




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Saying, " Gal, you 're looking shaky ; 

have a drop of old Jamaiky ; 
I 'm afeard there '11 be more trouble 

afore the job is done ; " 
Sol took one scorching swallow ; 

dreadful faint I felt and hollow, 
Standing there from early morning 

when the firing was begun. 



112 







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All through those hours of trial I 

had watched a calm clock dial, 
As the hands kept creeping, creeping, 

— they were creeping round to 
four, 

When the old man said, " They 're 
forming with their bagonets fixed 
for storming : 

It 's the death-grip that 's a-coming, 

— they will try the works once 
more." 

"5 




With brazen trumpets blaring, the 

flames behind them glaring, 
The deadly wall before them, in close 

array they come ; 
Still onward, upward toiling, like a 

dragon's fold uncoiling, — 
Like the rattlesnake's shrill warning 

the reverberating drum ! 
1 16 





Over heaps all torn and gory — shall 
I tell the fearful story, 

How they surged above the breast- 
work, as a sea breaks over a 
deck ; 

How, driven, yet scarce defeated, our 
worn-out men retreated, 

With their powder-horns all emptied, 
like the swimmers from a wreck ? 
119 




It has all been told and painted; as 

for me, they say I fainted, 
And the wooden-legged old Corporal 

stumped with me down the stair : 
When I woke from dreams affrighted 

the evening lamps were lighted, — 
On the floor a youth was lying ; his 

bleeding breast was bare. 




And I heard through all the flurry, 

" Send for WARREN ! hurry ! 

hurry ! 
Tell him here 's a soldier bleeding, 

and he '11 come and dress his 

wound ! " 
Ah, we knew not till the morrow told 

its tale of death and sorrow, 
How the starlight found him stiffened 

on the dark and bloody ground. 
123 





Who the youth was, what his name 
was, where the place from which 
he came was, 

Who had brought him from the bat- 
tle, and had left him at our door, 

He could not speak to tell us ; but 
't was one of our brave fellows, 

As the homespun plainly showed us 

which the dying soldier wore. 

124 




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For they all thought he was dying, 
as they gathered round him cry- 
ing, — 

And they said, " Oh, how they 11 miss 
him ! " and " What will his 
mother do ? " 

Then, his eyelids just unclosing like 
a child's that has been dozing, 

He faintly murmured, "Mother!" 

— and — I saw his eyes were 

blue. 

127 





" Why, grandma, how you 're wink- 
ing ! " Ah, my child, it sets me 
thinking 

Of a story not like this one. Well, 
he somehow lived along ; 

So we came to know each other, and 
I nursed him like a — mother, 

Till at last he stood before me, tall, 

and rosy-cheeked, and strong. 
128 





And we sometimes walked together 

in the pleasant summer weather, 
" Please to tell us what his name 

was ? " Just your own, my little 

dear, — 
There 's his picture Copley painted : 

we became so well acquainted, 
That _ in short, that 's why I 'm 

grandma, and vou children all 

are here ! " 



m 




